


no more sailin'

by babbyspanch



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Heartbreak, M/M, No Dialogue, Post-Canon, coming to terms with loving someone you've lost, sad old man, this is just angst town honestly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-22 14:14:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17664188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/babbyspanch/pseuds/babbyspanch
Summary: Somewhere beyond the seaSomewhere waiting for meMy lover stands on golden sandsAnd watches the ships that go sailin'___Francis prepares his first seal and comes to terms.





	no more sailin'

**Author's Note:**

> I did some research on this but please let me know if there's anything i've gotten wrong or need to change!

Francis had caught another seal. He was getting better and better at it, learning and studying from the patient Netsilik tribe. There was one woman in particular,  Tetqatsaq, who took her time speaking with him and helping him learn to account for his lost hand. She had been patient with him through many near meltdowns and so much bubbling frustration.

 

Francis had let go of many things in the months since they had disembarked Terror. His anger was the only thing he didn’t miss.

 

He laid the seal out as he had been taught, sliced back the blubber and started to draw out the intestine in long smooth motions.

 

Francis didn’t want to look at it. 

 

Even at a glance he can feel his throat tighten and his gut twist. If he looked at it any longer than that who knew what would happen. It felt so absolutely monumental and all encompassing that he couldn’t breathe around it. It sat on his chest, heavy leaden, and so cold.

 

But there is only so long you can force yourself to not know.

 

Especially when the months that passed, the weeks that passed, the days, the hours and the minutes are all screaming the same thing. The same words that twisted him up to look at, to breath life into them felt like it would suffocate him as surely as slipping under the ice.

 

Francis wanted to breathe again.

 

He had wanted so many things. 

 

He wanted to feel a lightness in his chest that had flown off long ago in that tent when he had first and last touched the warm skin-- 

 

And that was too close. Francis turned back to methodically slicing apart the seal in front of him, with movements practised but not yet easy.

 

It mostly worked, until the days got longer and longer again, until the watery sun had extended past her means. Some days Francis would be in mid-stride and the light would hit the rocks just so and everything would all come rushing into his head at once, disorderly and rioting, mutineers for his attention. 

 

The loudest thought among them was the contrast of bright, visceral red in a sharp line. Ringing slowly around a pool of dark brown, bringing beautiful colours to light. Ones he has never been able to see before because he never let himself look this long, not in such bright sunlight, not in such clear view, but it didn’t matter now, every time he looked at him it might be--

 

Francis sighed and placed his ulu down slowly. Took the slowest breath he could. Steadied, righted, adjusted his keel, got on the beam--

  
  


He covered his eyes with his hand. Breathed again. 

 

_ Easy, old boy. _ Francis grit his teeth. The wind didn’t have a tongue or teeth or lips. It didnt grow to use an accent it knew would help it rise above its station. It didn’t have that timber or pause or weight. That same low rumble that meant ‘pay attention, these words are important’. 

 

Unlike so many of his others.

 

But then, Francis would have traded every scrap of warmth in his skin and food in his belly if it meant he could hear James Fitzjames tell a story again.

 

He opened his eyes, took his hand from his face, locked eyes with the shock of red on the ground and breathed.

 

He missed him.

  
  
  


He ached for him.

  
  
  


He felt his absence as keenly as the sharp wind.

  
  
  
  
  


He had loved him. And would carry on loving him still.

  
  
  
  


James had said God wanted Francis to live on.

 

Francis didn’t give a shit what God wanted. But James had wanted him to live. So he would.

 

Francis picked up his ulu. He sliced away the blubber from the red, red meat. Unspooled the things that needed unspooling. Let himself look at the red. Braided the intestines with the easy, soothing motion he had been carefully taught by  Tetqatsaq .

 

And Francis lived.

**Author's Note:**

> this has been stuck in my head since i finished the show and my therapist told me to start thinking and exploring why this show resonates so damN HARD SO........ here u are
> 
> lesbiantex on tumblr come yell xoxox  
> my own love nifedick did some great beta work for me that means a repost!!


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